


our coming of age has come and gone (suddenly this summer it's clear)

by LilacsAndLilies



Category: A3! (Video Game)
Genre: Ace Kazunari, And they help Tenma figure out that he's Ace, Aro Misumi, Asexual Awareness Week, Asexuality, Gen, Misumi and Kazunari are in a QPR, So what, ace tenma, queer platonic relationship, yes i'm two weeks late
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-12
Updated: 2020-11-12
Packaged: 2021-03-10 02:00:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27526501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LilacsAndLilies/pseuds/LilacsAndLilies
Summary: Tenma can't figure out why he feels so unsettled by the idea of a relationship. Luckily, some of his fellow troupe mates are there to help him out.
Relationships: Ikaruga Misumi & Miyoshi Kazunari, Ikaruga Misumi & Sumeragi Tenma, Miyoshi Kazunari & Sumeragi Tenma
Comments: 10
Kudos: 31





	our coming of age has come and gone (suddenly this summer it's clear)

**Author's Note:**

> I had this idea for ace awareness week, but I didn't actually end up finishing until now. Better late than never ig. This was my first time writing these characters, so I hope y'all like it.

Tenma walked through the door and into the loud and busy lounge. It was Saturday evening, and the lack of plans meant most of the residents of the dorm had found themselves in the room, engaged in a wide variety of conversations. On the couch he saw Banri and Itaru staring intently at their phones, muttering curses at each other intermittently. Meanwhile, Tsuzuru and Omi were in the kitchen, discussing plans for dinner while Sakyo and Izumi were pouring over documents on the dining table. Out the window, he could see Kazunari taking pictures while Misumi, under Taichi’s request, was teaching how to do a backflip.

Tenma had hoped to take cover in the chaos and make his way to his room without being noticed, but alas, he wasn’t that lucky. On any other day, the sight of Izumi turning to give him a welcome and maybe a hug would have made him feel warm inside, but now the sight of Omi’s welcoming smile just made him feel even more uneasy. He just wanted to go to his room and scrub off the awkward emotions coating him from the day’s filming. 

He forced a smile onto his face—which was easy enough considering how good of an actor he was—and greeted the older company members before excusing himself to drop off his stuff. Once out of the lounge, it was only a matter of giving a quick wave to Taichi as he walked past and nodding in response to Kazunari’s “Hey Tenten!” before he finally made it to the stairs and could drop the expression on his face. 

He trudged up the stairs and into his room, grateful for how empty it was—he had passed Muku and Yuki doing homework on the way up— as he collapsed onto his bed, finally letting himself process the events of the day. It wasn’t like it was a particularly odd or stressful day. Today’s shoot was for the latest TV drama he found himself starring in. In particular, the scenes of the day were set during a party, the one where Tenma’s character finally got together with the other lead of the show, an actress he had acted beside before. He had been acting for a long time, so he couldn’t quite pinpoint when he went from acting as a little sibling to teenage students, to now, where he was supposed to be in uni. The roles grew as he did, morphing and asking more of him. He came for the acting, but the acting came with hand holding and fake kissing and conversations of… more. 

He shook his head frantically, pulling himself out of his thoughts. It wasn’t like he wasn’t used to it by now. The scripted lines of pulling someone into a bedroom or proposing were common enough, but every time he heard them he felt insects crawling up his skin. He knew acting was different from real life, but he couldn’t help wonder if this was what it was like anyway. What was wrong with him that every proclamation of love felt like a dissonant chord bouncing around his brain?

It wasn’t just the acting either, it was accidentally coming across Juza and Banri making out in their room with the door wide open, it was the endless amounts of fan letters saying “I love you” and screaming fans asking for a kiss or something more, it was the fanservice and the interviews asking about a special someone and Tenma was so tired of it all.

The sound of knocking had Tenma jerk up from where he had face planted into his own bed. “Who is it?” He froze for a second, not expecting his voice to sound as hoarse as it was. He raised a hand, lifting it up to his eyes, surprised by how wet they were. When did he start crying? 

“Misumi!” The older boy’s voice was bright and cheerful.

Tenma quickly used his sleeve to wipe away the beginnings of tears. “One second.” He glanced over himself, morphing his face back into its normal mask before getting up and walking over to the door. “Hey Misumi.”

The boy in question was standing in the doorway, a wide grin on his face. Tenma glanced down to see Kazunari and Muku were no longer in the courtyard.

“Hey Tenma~!” He walked in, settling on Tenma’s bed, before patting beside him. 

Tenma followed the cue and settled down beside Misumi, careful to cover the still slightly damp pillow. “What is it Misumi?” Tenma was more than a little confused by the sudden visit. At least it gave him the chance to stop his impending breakdown in its tracks and bottle it up again. 

“What’d you do today?” Misumi ignored the question.

“Uh… I was in a few shoots today. Just normal stuff, why?”

Misumi frowned. “It wasn’t a normal day, because you were sad when you came home, why were you sad?”

"I wasn't sad!" The words were a gut reaction as Tenma scrambled to muster up more confidence.

"You're still sad. Your smile looks all fake." He tilted his head to the side, staring intently at Tenma and making him feel exposed. 

"It's nothing."

"You know, whenever Kazu feels sad he does the same thing where he pretends he's not. He always feels better after a special triangle hug! Do you want one?"

Tenma was pretty sure Misumi wasn't supposed to say that. And also that the older boy was far more perceptive than anyone gave him credit for. Before he could respond, Misumi barreled towards him, pulling him into a hug. 

Tenma made a few token struggles before relaxing into the embrace. "I'm fine, just a little tired from the shoot."

"Hugs can help with that too."

Tenma couldn’t deny that. They sat there for a little longer, and Tenma’s thoughts slowly began to wander back towards the topics from before Misumi barged in. "Hey Misumi?" His voice was quiet and when the other boy didn’t respond, Tenma decided not to repeat himself, abandoning the discussion.

"Yeah Tenma?" Misumi responded a little while later. 

"Uh- do- how did you know you liked Kazunari?" 

“What do you mean?” Misumi tilted his head a little in confusion, pulling away from the hug. 

“You and Kazunari are dating right? How did you guys know you liked each other? What’s it like?” He had meant for the questions to sound casual, but before he could stop himself, the words tumbled out of my mouth.

“We’re not dating.” 

Tenma’s brain felt like a train that had suddenly stalled. “What?”

“We’re not dating.” Misumi repeated the words. “We’re just really really good friends. Kazu’s my favorite super ultra triangle.” 

Tenma blinked. “But…” He shuffled through all of his memories for a romantic incident he had witnessed. The two were really close and held hands and kissed each other’s foreheads and spent a lot of time together, so they had to be together right? Misumi pressed kisses to everyone’s cheeks and pulled them into hugs whenever he wanted, but it always looked like more with Kazunari, and he didn’t even know what they did when they were alone. “You’re so close?”

“It’s because I like spending time with Kazu.” Misumi chirped, clearly unaffected by Tenma’s complete confusion.

‘But you guys don’t… kiss or anything?” 

“Nope~”

“What.”

Misumi’s lips curled down after Tenma didn’t respond for a while. He turned towards the door, which Tenma just realized was open and oh no did he really ask all of that while the door was open? “Kazu!”

As if expecting the summons, Kazunari bounded into the room, launching himself onto the bed and quickly making himself comfortable at Misumi’s side. Their shoulders were touching and Misumi seemed to lean into Kazunari and Tenma couldn’t help but marvel at how comfortable they looked together. “Yeah Sumi?”

“Tenma’s confused.”

Kazunari turned to Tenma. “What’s up Tenten?” 

Internally, Tenma winced at having to explain all of this again. The words felt like sandpaper against his tongue as he repeated them in the empty room. “Are you guys dating?”

Kazunari jerked for a second, clearly not expecting the question. “Nope. Why?”

Tenma hummed, dragging out the sound as he tried to pull his thoughts back into having some semblance of reason and understanding. “Are you ever gonna date someone?”

“Where’s all of this coming from Tenten? You got a crush or something?” Kazunari grinned, but his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes.

“Just answer the question.”

His smile dropped. “Probably not. I mean, ok- lemme start from the beginning.”

Tenma raised his eyebrow, but didn’t stop Kazunari from speaking.

“There’s this fancy thing called a QPP," he gestured in attempts to emphasize the phrase. "It stands for Queer Platonic Partnership and it basically means that me and Sumi aren’t dating, but we’re like, more than besties."

"We're super ultra triangle friends!" Misumi interjected and Kazunari grinned.

"Yup, we call it super ultra triangle friends. Anyway, we do lots of things that friends do and then some things friends don’t do, which is probably why you thought we were dating,” he paused, putting up a hand to wave off Tenma, “Which is totes fine btw, it’s just, we don’t kiss or do any of that stuff, mostly because Sumi’s not about that life, and I don’t really wanna deal with actively getting into a relationship because Sumi's more important anyway, so instead we're just kinda in the middle."

Besides Kazunari, Misumi had a bright grin on his face as he heard Kazu speak. "You're important to me too Kazu!" 

Tenma watched the two of them, his head swimming with the information that Kazunari had just provided. Some of it had given him a little hope and he decided to clarify it before the hope got too big and inevitably squashed. "What do you mean when you say Misumi isn't about that life?"

Kazunari just glanced over at Misumi, who immediately started talking. "Well I don't really like kissing." At Tenma’s blank stare he added. "On the lips. I'd rather go find triangles. And I think I love everyone, just like I love acting and I love triangles, so it seems silly to say I only love one person."

"So… not everyone wants to be in love and do all of that stuff?" Tenma hesitated, dragging out the words. 

Misumi nodded, the ever present smile clear on his face. Kazu just responded, "yup, if you don't like being in relationships it's called being aro. If you don't like having sex and stuff it's called being ace. Sounds mega cool right? Like a card or something."

"Ace." Tenma mumbled under his breath, noting the word for research later. "Thanks you two."

"No problemo Tenten. Glad we could help."

"You look a little happier now Tenma~"

Tenma gave him a small smile. "I guess I am." Then he straightened up, slowly piecing back together his regular confidence. "I have to do homework now."

Misumi jumped off the bed, Kazunari following after him. "Ok, we're gonna go look for more triangles then. Bye Tenma!" Misumi grabbed Kazunari’s hand and dragged him out the door, luckily closing it behind them.

Tenma flopped back onto his bed, taking a second to process everything that had just happened. He repeated the words Kazunari had mentioned and he got comfortable again, resting on the now dry pillow. Then he pulled out his phone and got to researching, his thankfulness for his troupe mates keeping a fond smile through it all. 

**Author's Note:**

> if you wanna talk bout a3! or anything else, you can find me @lilacsandlilies4 on tumblr!


End file.
